Fan-video competitions? We wouldn’t know anything about that. But there’s a new one on the horizon, anyway, with BBC Worldwide turning to Youtube – and YOU, the fans – to celebrate the release of Back to Earth on iTunes.

Here’s the long and skinny and short of it, as helpfully surmised by The Official Red Dwarf Fan Club’s Jo Sharples:

On Monday 22nd March a Youtube competition will be launching to mark the arrival of Red Dwarf: Back to Earth on iTunes.

To compete, entrants will need to submit an impersonation of a Red Dwarf character – videos can be posted to the Red Dwarf channel takeover on the BBC Comedy Greats Youtube channel once the competition launches next Monday.

So in the meantime get practising – top prizes up for grabs include a pair of free tickets to Dimension Jump and lots of Red Dwarf goodies. The competition will be judged by the Red Dwarf team at Grant Naylor Productions.

We’re not quite sure what Youtube and iTunes have got to do with one-another, given that they’re owned by two companies that are generally in direct competition in an assortment of markets, but THERE YOU GO.

There’s also a fan page on Facebook from which you can get further info on the competition once it launches on Monday. So GET TO IT. I think I’m going to do the bit where Birdman offers Pete some seed.

I thought about recreating escape attempt from the simulants in Gunmen Of The Apocalypse. But instead of using my upside down chin……I thought my genitalia would make a good representation of the ambassador of the Vindaloovian Empire!!

Just a bit of light-hearted fun really, much like Ridley’s original comment. But you could say that, since Rimmer’s a fictional character too, the fact that Mr Flibble is a puppet is kind of moot.

He “spoke” within the reality of the programme, and with a different voice to Rimmer (illustrating that he’s the product of a multiple personality disorder brought upon by the holovirus). He doesn’t exist within the true reality of the show, but neither does the peacenik from Polymorph and an impression of that would, presumably, be fine.